The first person to react to my awakening, other than Rayne of course, was one of the women I had never seen before who was right next to me. She wore surprisingly heavy-looking, conventional metal armor and was one of the first people I had seen since I left Hasperburg to do so. She also wore a veil covering the lower half of her face, revealing only her scarlet-colored eyes. In one of her hands, she held a sword with a blade made of solidified light, much like my own signature, experimental blade.
She reacted to me audibly, by gasping as she gazed into my now open eyes. We stared at each other for a moment, and as we did so I quietly studied her very soul, using one of my newly acquired powers related to souls. I effortlessly learned her name and even what her affiliation was: she was a member of a strange order of warriors who had been waiting for the Anax of Anal to be named so that they may find and serve him. She had come here during the time I spent unconscious and had forced her way here so that she and the order she was a part of could pledge their loyalty to me. I smiled at her, and it was when I smiled that the others fully reacted to me suddenly awakening.
"Oh, shiii..." One of the people around the warrior uttered a man who wore the same sort of starmazon armor that Aster wore. The others around him turned and glared, which was what caused him to correct his language and stop short of cussing in front of me, as well as feel a healthy amount of fear and embarrassment at the verbal faux pas he had just made. I grinned at the man, even as I heard his heart pounding in his chest due to the powers of those around him and the glares they shot him.
I sat up, as I had been laying on a table in the middle of the medical suite I was in when I came too. This caused those around me to back up respectfully from me, giving me space to breathe even as they began to smile and visibly relaxed, grateful that I was coming too. I looked around me, before my gaze settled on Zaria and Stella who stood beside each other.
"Hello everyone. How long have I been unconscious?" I asked, as I fully took in my surroundings. The sheer scale and scope of the machines that surrounded me, more than a few of which I was also connected to via patches on my skin, was quite impressive. As was the variety of the entourage that surrounded me.
I was surrounded by various figures that I recognized, such as the "Superior Genies" who had a pact with Stella, and figures that I didn't recognize such as a small group of men and women in elegant robes that covered their whole bodies. I sensed that the majority of people in the room were already loyal, if not to me, then either to Stella or to Cassandra, and that some were more curious than anything else.
"You've been unconscious for about a day and a half, my lord." The woman that I had gazed at informed me, before bowing to me and placing her hand on her chest. She began to radiate an air of sincere devotion and elation, delighted to have spoken to me. I turned to her, and felt the devotion and elation she felt skyrocket as she felt the sinful power of my gaze fall upon her body and sear her soul.
"I see... And who, may I ask, are you?" I asked her, opting to keep the scope of my newfound abilities hidden for now. She began to smile openly and gazed up at me before speaking.
"I am Maria, a member of an ancient order of warrior women who have spent millennia training and honing our bodies, souls, and minds for the day that the Anax of Anal would arise. So that we may serve him, as his personal concubines and versatile servants. I am but one of hundreds of such women, all of whom are ready to give ourselves fully to you." She explained, speaking as energetically as a young child who has just been given a much-desired pet might. The others listened to her explanation curiously, especially the trio of genies who were also here, and were in fact one of Stella's most prized resources. Maria also wasn't finished speaking.
"The order possesses a powerful capital ship, one that is close by and is filled with its members. We have long been adherents of Cassandra's, but our true devotion was always to the Anax, so we are overjoyed that you have finally emerged. I pledge myself to you, and as representative of the order pledge it, to you. To serve you, eternally." She told me, excitedly. I smiled and sighed pleasantly at the end of her explanation as I felt the power of her oath fill me, thanks to my own powers as a sanguinarch who could gain power from oaths and pledges.
My skin began to glow, just slightly, from the power of her oath which I sensed subtly impressed the others who had arrived here to greet me when I awoke. I smiled and turned to them, beginning with the faction of individuals who wore robes that covered their entire bodies. They sensed my gaze and didn't fall to their knees in supplication but they respectfully refused to meet my gaze out of fear for inspiring some emotion in me. One of them, a man in a pink robe stepped forward and began to speak.
"Greetings oh mighty Anax. I am Thomas, a citizen of the space-palace of Aura. I was granted the privilege of coming here and being the first of my people, all of whom have attained enlightenment and seek to serve the Lord of Sex, to welcome you to our home. We, like the people of Maria's order, are among those who seek to know and serve the mighty king who will free the spirit queens of sex." Thomas explained, gazing at me respectfully as he spoke. His particular faction was made up of both men and women, but the men were closer to me, presumably so that they could soak up the majority of the pheromones I radiated without losing themselves in them.
"It is my honor to be here and to join Maria in pledging our resources to you. We know of your desire to unify the omniverse, and we applaud it. We also celebrate your victory over the Dark Prince, and your other achievements. The resources we wield, and shall give over to you as a sign of our loyalty and devotion, are considerable." Thomas explained, his eyes beginning to glow pridefully as he launched into an explanation of the power his people possessed.
"We are so mighty that we can reshape galaxies and even create stars by using our particular arcanotech, all of which we shall give you freely. And of course we are a theocratic state with a religion that worships the queens of sex, as well as their husband: whom we believe to be you." Thomas explained, revealing that his people adhered to the idea that there was only going to be one husband to the four sister-queens of sex, which was also, rather unsurprisingly, my personal belief as well.
"Our high priestesses, each of which is a devotee of a specific queen of sex, aside from the one who is a devotee of you in your aspects as the truest Anael and the grandest adonis opted not to visit you today as they wanted to sway you to come to visit them yourself, but each of them is excited to meet you and... Serve you, in the way that their mistresses will serve you someday." Thomas informed me, causing me to smile at his minor discomfort. His statement also revealed that his people were aware of my true nature as a grand adonis and anael, which filled me with curiosity about what else his people knew.
"We, of course, applaud your desire to see the Etherscape Empire rebuilt, and indeed many of our own citizens are those who attained enlightenment from within Etherscape and then joined us either before or after the empire was shattered by the legion of ascendants who banded together in a nearly unprecedented scale to pillage the shattered empire. There are those within our city who were overjoyed to hear of your desire to reform Etherscape." Thomas added, smiling as he spoke to me, himself seemingly genuinely moved by my altruistic goal.
"The shattering of Etherscape is a tragedy, one that I aim to correct in the days to come." I replied, speaking for the first time in several minutes. His smile grew in intensity at my words, nodding at me as I spoke, before he turned to face his companions. None of them stepped forward to speak, all of them seemingly awed by even the passive aura that surrounded me now.
For the first time, a member of the trio of genies who had served Stella for over a decade stepped forward. All three of them were divinely beautiful women and wore similar outfits made up of the sort of pants a belly dancer would wear, a veil that covered the lower halves of their faces, and a simple "bra" made largely of precious gemstones. Each of them had different colored pants and had different colored hair, one was a brunette, one was a redhead, and one was a blonde. The one who stepped forward was the brunette.
"Greetings oh Master of the Starmazon Armada, and Conquerer of Stella. My name is Hypatia and I am the greatest wish-granter of Stella's coven of hyper-genies. I can sense that you possess more similarity to myself than I may tell at a glance, you... smell like a genie, somehow." She said softly, her voice a quiet whisper. I gazed at her for a moment, studying her soul as intently as I had studied Maria's, before opting to stand up and allow my legs to melt away.
The instant that I stood up, my legs melted into mystical smoke, disappearing behind a haze of delicious-smelling smog. This caused Hypatia's eyes to widen in shock and delight as she began to instantly piece together one aspect of my bizarre true nature. I smiled at her and began to speak.
"When I made my way to the Eternal City one of the people who joined my harem was a princess named Disha. She was no ordinary princess, but as befitted someone who had the ability to make it to the Eternal City she was a princess of genies. Genies from the mysterious veiled world of Earth, who fled in the wake of their creator's murder. She joined my harem and she also transformed me into one of your kind, a rare type of genie known as a Zaar." I explained, revealing the origin of my acquired nature as a genie for the first time since the night that Disha first gave me this new font of power. My words caused Hypatia's eyes to sparkle with joy and surprise.
"A Zaar... So the oracle was right..." She gushed, happiness clearly audible in her voice as she spoke. My words stunned Hypatia, but one of her companions stepped forward in her place: the redheaded genie. The genie began to speak almost immediately.
"Raul... My companions and I are the last members of our kind of genie, as our kind were hunted down and enslaved in such conditions that even we couldn't survive. Each member of our kind can warp reality in truly tremendous ways and thus we were hunted down and enslaved by evil ascendants and their minions, who used us endlessly. The three of us were born to some of the last unenslaved members of our kind and were able to flee our universe, escaping into this one after years of living on the run in our native lands." She told me, sorrow filling her voice as she spoke.
"We made our way to Stella, after learning of the nature of starmazons as women who took in any women provided they obeyed the rules of starmazon culture. We made a pact with her to serve her as her personal wish-granting servants so long as she protected us. Our kind is so powerful that no mortal could hope to breed successfully with us, not even one as mighty as Stella, even with the parthenogenic technology possessed by the starmazons so we instead contented ourselves on our newfound freedom, but with you here..." The redheaded genie informed me, before beginning to smile.
"Long ago we were told by a kindly oracle that if we escaped the universe of our birth we could find someone who possessed both a kind heart and the power needed to successfully breed with us so that our species may live on, and maybe even someday become powerful enough to avenge ourselves on those who enslaved us. I see that her words were not simply the speech of someone who hoped to give us some shred of hope to cling to, but a true and accurate prediction..." She told me, gazing at me with an incredible level of hope and faith.
"A Zaar is supposedly able to breed true with any kind of genie, even ones from other universes. If that is true, and I believe it to be true, then if you work with us, if you let us, someday our species may rise to prominence again!" She told me, excitedly. Fortunately for me, I didn't have to respond to her right away, as the final member of their trio stepped up and placed a gentle hand on her excited companion's shoulder before beginning to speak.
"Grace, relax. Don't overwhelm our new emperor." The blonde cautioned, even as she turned to me and smiled. She had the darkest skin tone of all of the women, and had a rather relaxed demeanor. She gazed at me with cool blue eyes and I stared back, smiling gently at her. We were coolly studying each other, our eyes meeting as equals rather than as an emperor and one of his subjects. I quickly realized that she was the strategist of the coven and was their most cold member.
"I see what you are. You are not merely an emperor, you are a sultan. Or... rather, sultan-souled." She said, rather coyly, as we kept studying each other. That brought a large, impressed smile to my face. It was also an accurate estimation of my power and was something I had never revealed to anyone aside from Disha, who had overseen the ceremony in which I became a Zaar. I nodded at her, my eyes now focused intently on hers.
I possessed the soul of a sultan, which was the font of my power as a Zaar since I hadn't really tapped into that aspect of myself since becoming one. My sultan-soul allowed me to do far more than most genies could do, even if I didn't factor in any of my other powers. As a genie I had the potential to significantly warp reality and could alter the omniverse in all manner of ways, provided I had the right wishes to grant. That was something that I planned to take advantage of, someday, but not an immediate priority of mine.
"I am. Does that intrigue you?" I told her, upfront and without any sort of fancy sophistry. She considered my words for a moment, before nodding at me.
"It does. My companions are... rather excitable, but I am... Well, I try not to be like them, as much as I love them. I am Artemisia, and when we fled from our native universe I was the closest thing we had to a leader. My sister is named Grace. Allow me to be the one of us who formally introduces us. You conquered Stella, she who had offered us protection in exchange for granting her wishes and being some of her companions in bed. We have no real desire to leave her side, and I suspect that you are generous enough that that may not be necessary." She told me, causing me to nod in agreement.
"I intend to make use of Stella's exceptional experience in battle and to keep her active. As her companions, you are doing me a great service by serving her and aiding her. That said... If you seek to pursue your actual goals, there will need to be a new oath you three swear." I informed the genie, shooting straight and not mincing words. The three genies gazed at me, and I sensed the lust in their gazes. I smiled and closed my eyes as I said what I said next.
"The future you three seek, where the injustices against your kind are righted and where your species is not limited solely to the three of you, is a far off one. That said it is a future that I possess the power to create. If you truly seek it, then swear an oath of obedience to me. Swear yourselves and your resources to my empire." I told them, causing their eyes to open in both alarm and also a sort of secret delight.
This was what they had wanted to hear. This promised them a way forward, not a chance to exist in safety and comfort, but a chance for vengeance and to take hold of the future. I gazed at their souls, even through my closed eyes, and studied them, their power, and their abilities. It was while I did that that I spoke next.
"I have no problem admitting that your personal powers as genies surpass mine, in the context of my might as a genie. And I'll also freely admit that I want that power. I want to use it to protect my people, to combat tyrants and tyranny, and, admittedly, to further my own might. So I will make a deal with you. If the three of you agree to serve me, to use your powers as I see fit, I will take my time and use my powers to bolster your numbers and to one day turn my empire in the direction of your birthplace." I told the trio, as well as the others present in the room.
"If you serve me there will come a day when we will reach our hands into the universe of your birth and we will defeat those who enslaved your kin. We will free those who have survived, resurrect those who have died, and lead your people towards a glorious new epoch. Serve me and secure the future of your people. Stop the slow stagnation you have suffered while here, unable to actually advance your own objectives and refuse to spend another day surviving but not truly living." I uttered, aware of the powerful words I was uttering. I felt my speech fill the hearts of the coven, and I knew that I was but a step away from acquiring their oaths of service. So I stepped forward and took that final step.
I pointed at Grace and a cosmic ray of lifeforce shot out of my fingertip and struck the mighty genie. She rose into the air ever so slightly and moaned as she began to radiate an intense amount of blinding white light. She let out a staggeringly beautiful and erotic moan as life-creating divine energy filled her womb and began to form the barest beginnings of life deep within her. Shortly after she let out the moan I continued to speak.
"As a gift, and as a sign of my goodwill have this present from a cosmic god of life. I have just filled Grace with lifeforce, lifeforce that is even now spreading through her and making her become the mother of what will soon be the newest member of your kind to fill the omniverse." I told the trio, as well as the others who had assembled around me to celebrate the crowning of the Anax of Anal.
I was a trifold ascendant being, meaning that I wasn't just a sanguinarch or an archdemon, I was both and I was also a cosmic deity. Cosmic deities are among the strongest kinds of gods in existence, capable of channeling their powers in a litany of reality-shaking ways and every bit as ascendant as sanguinarchs or archdemons. In time I planned to become a Dragon Lord as well, but that goal was one I knew I'd only achieve in the distant future.
I had the ability to influence various domains to truly astounding degrees as a cosmic god, and one of the domains I could influence was the domain of life. By influencing that domain it was all too easy for me to bless Grace in such a way that I allowed her to become pregnant without a sexual partner of any sort, though I did plan to more traditionally impregnate her in the future once she and her fellow coven members agreed to serve me. Given her desires, I easily pieced together that this was the surest way to showcase both my own reality-warping powers and to give her an astoundingly personal gift that she would cherish. And I was right.
The genie gazed at me, awestruck and moved by the personal gift I had just given her. I sensed her personal devotion to me become nearly unbreakable as she reeled from the revelation I had just dropped. I could sense even Artemesia fill with awe as she took in the weight of my powers over life.
"And someday I shall not only create new members of your kind, but I also restore to life those who perished." I told the trio, honestly. I wanted them, and the rest of their race, to serve me and I was ready and willing to utilize my powers to aid them and restore them if it meant that they joined my empire and served me. All three members of Stella's coven turned to me and fell to their knees, Grace gently falling to the ground as she did so. I smiled at them, and listened as Artemesia began to speak.
"Raul, oh mighty emperor of the Empire of Raul... If you shall aid us in pursuing justice for our kind, we three shall swear to serve you." She exclaimed, still taking in the sheer enormity of the power I possessed. I grinned at her, and listened as Grace began to speak.
"We shall see our kind restored, our dignity restored. If the cost of attaining that is service to you... That is a cost I shall happily pay." The genie whispered, devotion visible in her gaze as she saw in me what she had always wanted: a future.
"I seek justice. I seek hope. I seek a future for my kind. The way forward is clear. To attain all I desire, I must join your empire. Please, allow me to become a citizen of your empire, an ally of yours, and a resource to be commanded. All so that someday our kind shall rise again." Hypatia whispered, eagerness audible in her voice, as she smiled and knelt before me. I turned to them and rose my hand even as the potency of their pledge filled me with a hefty amount of essence.
"In exchange for your service, for your loyalty, I shall see it to that those who long ago enslaved you are held accountable, even from beyond the grave. Someday we shall return to your universe, armed with an army of those who seek to exact justice for you and avenge the wrongs you suffered." I told the trio, my voice low with anger on their behalf.
"There will come a day when we rebuild what you lost. When we shall restore that which was taken from you. So live in hope, and joyously serve so that said day shall come faster." I whispered, even as our bodies began to glow and a potent connection was formed between us, our bond, our oath, empowering us all.
